Trail Guide to Learning Review

We are about to begin our twelfth year of homeschooling. We are super excited and have been for the past three school years. The main reason why is because of our wonderful curriculum. Here is the review I sent them of their product.

I have been homeschooling since 1997. I have four children, 25, 19, 13 and 10. I started out homeschooling my two oldest children who were 5^th grade and Kindergarten at the time. Needless to say, I have used various curriculums over the years and found things I loved and didn’t love. And I found things that worked with one child didn’t work with the second child. We had times of public school and private school for the younger three children in the middle of our homeschooling years. But after a year and a quarter of public school and two years of private school we were back to homeschooling. The first year we used the math they were using in the private school and found we loved it so we still use it (Math U See). We will be beginning our fifth year back to homeschooling this fall. Three years ago I found Trail Guides to Learning and it changed our homeschool experience into something I always hoped it would be, amazing and fun for them and me.

Trail Guides to Learning fit our family just right. I needed something already put together with lesson plans that weren’t overwhelming and easy to follow. The fact that it was based on books instead of text books was an added plus to me. Text books can be so dry but novels come alive when you read them. I loved how you could buy everything all at once without having to go hunt things down. I also love the middle school supplement that is offered with each level. We used the middle school supplement because one of my children is one grade higher than each one said it covered. I loved the extra book for each unit. That became our book we used for dictation and that they read silently each day. We used the other three books for each of us to read aloud to the “class”. My younger child reads the easiest and my older child reads whichever of the other two he chooses while I read the one remaining. We got so many different looks at each period of time.

The middle school supplement had extra work that you could assign to challenge your students. It was easy to understand and the kids were able to complete it in a timely manner. I love how I can teach both of my children from one lesson but give the older one more without it disrupting our flow. In fact, I often give my younger child the same extra assignments if I feel she can handle it. Even though she is two grades below my son, my daughter has excelled and done most of the same extended work he has. Sometimes she is more willing to do the extended work than the older one is.

I have and will continue to recommend this program to any and all who are homeschooling or thinking about it. After seeing the different curriculums for the past 15 years I can honestly say it is the best program for our family and I wish it had been around when I taught my older two children. We have such fun discovering history together. I never had this much fun when I was in school but I am learning along with my children and having fun. We connect what we have learned with so many things we see and do in our everyday lives.

Thanks so much for creating this program and please keep working on the ones for the years to come. We look forward to going through high school with Trail Guides to Learning series!

That is our progress report for today. Thanks for stopping by.

Home School Book Fair Next Week

I don't know about you, but I get so excited about the Home School Book Fair every year. I love walking up and down those isles seeing all the new things there are and the old things that have lasted through the years. I usually have at least an idea of what I want to get. Last year I found the BEST curriculum EVER. It's called Trail Guides to Learning. They include every subject except Math. Which is fine for us because we have been using Math U See for the past 5 years and don't intend to stop now.

Back to our core curriculum. This school year we did Paths of Exploration. We enjoyed it so much. This kids and I both learned a great deal. I started homeschooling in 1997. I can honestly say this curriculum worked best for the kids and for their teacher. Next year we will be doing Paths of Settlement. They are coming out with the next in the series in August called Paths of Progress. Each set goes up a grade. They are planning on continuing all through high school, which thrills me to no end.

I have to be honest and say we only did a little over half of Paths of Exploration. But we are going to finish it up at the start of the next school year and then continue on with Paths of Settlement. I love homeschooling because of this very reason. We can always do more later if we do less now. Or we can do more now and less a little later. We just enjoy the learning process and keep it fun.

This year we finished Math the last week of March. Can you believe that? I can't. We were scheduled to finish in April but they just decided they would finish it up even earlier. I am not one to say no to doing more work that I require. Less, yes. But more? No way. Go for it. This next year JC will be doing PreAlgebra. Needless to say I am NOT looking forward to that. But I love this program so it is my hope that it will help me help him. It has so far.

I will be buying two years worth of school supplies because it is our hope that we will be sent overseas during this school year. I want to be prepared so that we can take it all with us instead of having to order it.

Although we are done with our basic school for this year I have added some things to finish out April and work through the summer. They are learning basic household duties and scheduling. It isn't running totally smoothly as of yet but it is a work in progress that I hope to carry on into the school year and beyond. We have a set schedule for laundry, what days we do what color clothes, and alternate which child does them that day to completion. We alternate who does the dishes each day and who helps cook the meals. I am teaching them how to make complete meals on their own.

We are bumping up our reading for the summer. They are having to read larger books in a shorter amount of time. We discuss the book as they are reading it and not just at the end of the book. It helps them to understand what they are reading and remember it. It is my intention to teach them how to do a book review like the ones I do on my writers blog. That will help them take the meaning out of the book that the author intended them to find.

We will be going on a HUGE "field trip" in June to East Africa. We are so excited about that. You can find out more information on that by reading our cross cultural ministry blog. I can't wait to share pictures from that trip.

I will be uploading pictures and information about our homeschool book fair trip next week. Thanks for stopping by.

First Week of School 2010

Our first day of school was Monday. 8-9-10. The kids got a big kick out of that. They figured it out when they wrote the date on their first page. We have had a great first three days of school. Some new things we are doing have made it so great. We are using the same Math-U-See, which we LOVE. We are doing the Paths for Exploration for our main curriculum. For our Bible curriculum the Paths of Exploration has a Bible supplement that we do daily called Light for the Trail.

We also have Precept Ministries Discovery 4 Yourself Kids Monday, Wednesday and Friday's. We are doing the Making Brothers and Sisters Best Friends on Tuesday and Thursdays. We start our days with our Bible time. In the Light for the Trail the kids work on memory verses and how they relate to our lives and what needs to change in our lives to line up with God's Word. They have a Bible notebook that they write in each day. And a memory project they work on every three weeks that is a longer amount of verses.

Then we either do math or start on our Paths of Exploration. After we finish that up we have lunch. The kids have an hour or so reading time. They have chosen a novel from the list I have put together. The two novels they are reading are The Lightning Thief and Ella Enchanted. (Ella Enchanted was her sisters book!)

Each week we have a game that we play every day. We have a container with slips of paper that have games on them. We pick a game out of the container and that is our game for that week. This weeks is Canasta. We are keeping our score from each day and adding on to it. A lot of the games we are learning how to play together and some of them are games I played as a child and youth. Canasta is one I played when I was young. I wanted to pass it on to them.

We will add PE to the mix next week. They do play outside each day with friends and this week have played in the gym at church each night. Our days are so full that may be the majority of what they do until there is FBCA basketball in the spring.

We have our nightly Bible time with dad. Right now we are studying angels. We are learning so much about them. We are hearing things about angels in our lessons at church and during the sermons that we pull out because we are studying them. We share them in our nightly Bible time when we learn something about angels outside of that. The kids each look up verses during that time. They are getting very good at finding any book in the Bible. They will both be doing Bible Drill with the church after the first of the year. We are so blessed to have the head of our household leading us each day to search God's Word and learn His truths.

That is the basics of our school days. I will do my best to add pictures when I can. I will take the kids to the park soon and take school pictures of them. I am sure they have changed so much since last years pictures!

That is our progress report for today. Thanks for stopping by. 

Home School Book Fair 2009

Every year in Arlington the weekend of Mother's Day the Home School Book Fair is that Friday and Saturday. We set aside that weekend for family time. A time to focus on the past school year and what we accomplished or didn't. And a time to focus on the coming school year and what we want to accomplish during that time for each child. It is such a joy and a privilege to have this responsibility. I wouldn't trade it for anything! 

The kids were able to finish up their school work on Thursday. That is the first time we have done that and we really like it. So that will be our goal from now on, to be finished before the book fair! We may have to work a little harder in some areas at certain times of the year but we will still not start until after Labor Day and we will still take a winter holiday from Thanksgiving week through New Years. We do so much during that time anyway, just not workbooks. 

This year, while I did get the traditional math workbooks that we enjoy, my heart was drawn to things that will prepare my preteens for the things that will be coming in the near future. It may seem early for that when my children are only 10 and almost 8 but I know that if I let this window of time slip by and do not prepare them in the way that the Lord is leading me to do then I am not doing my job correctly as a mother. The world has such different standards than the Lord does. So if I want my children to have the Lords standards for handling things then I need to get to them before the world does. 

I found this neat series for preteens and young teens and their moms called Secret Keeper Girl. It is for moms and daughters. I purchased the younger version of the 8 Great Dates for you and your daughter. I also got the Bible study called: My Best Friend Jesus. I want my daughter to know that above all, Jesus needs to be her best friend. And that I am here for her in all things. My older daughter and I went through some hard times so I am trying to learn from the mistakes I made. We are very close now but went through a lot to get here. I am hoping I can help my other little princess have an easier road.

I also got the Beautifully Made set. It teaches her about the changes that are going on in her body and how to deal with them. There is one for younger girls like her and then when she does start. There is also one for moms. It has ideas for celebrations you can do with your daughter when that time comes. It helps them celebrate the changes that God created instead of dreading them. I am very excited to do this because I didn't learn them this way. I learned most of it from kids from school. Not really the best way. 

I also found some things for the guys in my family. Most of them are to teach them what God expects them to be as a godly man. I even found one for moms called Preparing Him for the Other Woman: A Mother's Guide to Raising Her Son to Love a Wife and Lead a Family. I thought that would be really good for me to read.

I am praying that this new school year will be full of wonderful memories for our family and building blocks to a godly life for my youngsters!

That is our progress report for today. Thanks for stopping by.